The Pains of War
by Kittenklaws13
Summary: This is a futurefic in which Fiore is being ravaged by war. It's meant to show the side of war that is not so glorious, and as a tribute to whomever has risked their life on a battlefield.
1. Chapter 1

**This is a futurefic, but not a good one. Makarov and Gildarts have died in a surprise attack by Acnologia. Igneel, Grandine, and Metalicana came just in time to save everyone else. Almost all humans but those in dark guilds have been annihilated. The forts constructed by Fairy Tail, Lamia Scale, Blue Pegasus and Sabertooth are some of the last human strongholds. It's not a mistake not to include Quatro Cerberus or Mermaid Heel, their forts fell. All of the Guild Masters have been slaughtered, except Sting because Acnologia thought that he could always come back later to take his life.**

**This is set three years past the Grand Magic Games. Acnologia attacked one year after the GMG. He's allied with Zeref, all the demons and all the dark guilds.**

* * *

**Stronghold Data**

**Fairy Tail**

**Head: Natsu Dragneel**

**Deputies: Gray Fullbuster, Erza Scarlet, Gajeel Redfox and Laxus Dreyar**

**Head of Defense: Levy McGarden**

**Head of Healing: Wendy Marvell**

**Quartermaster: Lucy Heartfilia**

**Mythical Allies: Igneel, Grandine, Metalicana and Amari(The Phoenix Emperor, an old friend of Igneel's.)**

**Mage Population: 127**

**Soldier Population: 13423**

**Approximate**** Total Population: 1500000**

**Lamia Scale**

**Head: Jura Neekis**

**Deputy: Lyon Vastia**

**Head of Defense: Yuka Suzuki**

**Head of Healing: Chelia Blendy**

**Quartermaster: Sherry Blendy**

**Mythical Allies: Sucan (The Ice Dragon King, slightly more powerful than Igneel), Gloami (The King of the Dwarfs, who has taken a liking to Jura. Not in that way, perverts) and Tracia (The Lamia Empress. Do you even have to ask why she's helping them?)**

**Mage Population: 67**

**Soldier Population: 6734**

**Approximate**** Total Population: 700000**

**Blue Pegasus**

**Head: Ichiya Vandalay Kotobuki**

**Deputies: None**

**Head of Defense: Hibiki Lates**

**Head of Healing: Ren Akatsuki**

**Quartermaster: Eve Tearm**

**Mythical Allies: Krana (The Elf Queen), Falleia, (The Dragon of Illusion, Grandine's half sister) and Veritas (The Dragon of Order).**

**Mage Population: 59**

**Soldier Population: 6598**

**Approximate**** Total Population: 600000**

**Sabertooth**

**Head: Sting Eucliffe**

**Deputy: Rouge ****Cheney**

**Head of Defense: Dobengal**

**Head of Healing: Rufus Lore**

**Quartermaster: Rufus Lore**

**Mythical Allies: Lanoia and Erainon (The White and Shadow Dragons that succeeded Weisslogia and Skiadrum)**

**Mage Population: 46**

**Soldier Population: 5371**

**Approximate**** Total Population: 400000**

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** This information is provided only as a reference. The focus of this series of oneshots is going to be war and it's effects. It's meant as a tribute to all soldiers. Not just those of the USA, but all who have fought for something, or someone, that they cared about.**

**I have never been in a war, nor has anyone that I know. If they have, they haven't told me. I won't pretend to know anything about what it's like to out there on the battlefield, risking life and limb. This is purely out of what I think it might be like. If any actual war veterans out there are offended by this, just tell me. This is for you.**


	2. Chapter 2: Lies and Damnation

**This is from Natsu's perspective. It's somewhat ooc, but remember that he's be the head of the Fairy Tail fort for 2 years, the same time as the war has been going on.**

**Listen to the song Heart Of A Hero by Steve Holy while reading for an increased effect. It's on Youtube.  
**

**Veterans, I salute you.**

* * *

I walked across the battlefield, paying no heed to the dead bodies laying around me. I had seen too many to truly be able to grieve for each person that died under my command, yet at the same time my heart broke for each and every one of them. It was not that I was numb to the deaths, more like I was so deep in my sorrow for them that I could not go any deeper without losing my ability to function.

**There.** I saw what I had been looking for. That woman had moved, just slightly. I ran over to her, my scarf flowing out behind me.

But as soon as I knelt next to her, I saw that there was nothing that I could do. Her wounds were too deep. She wouldn't last long enough for me to even get her to a field doctor.

Her eyelids fluttered open, and I was surprised by the intensity in them. This woman was still incredibly focused even on the brink of death. She looked up at my in wonder. "Salamander." She whispered in awe.

I nodded in acknowledgement of the name. She swallowed roughly. "Am I dying?" Her tone was hoarse, probably for the smoky air. Even though I hadn't fought, there had still been plenty of fire mages on both sides.

I hesitated, than nodded again. It wouldn't help to give her false hope.

A weak smile place across her lips. "Heh. I guess that it was my time." She paused. "Did we win?"

I was torn. In truth, I had tried to hard to get here and passed out. Laxus had done his best, but he had been exhausted as well. Here, we'd lost. But could I really tell that to a dying woman? Should I tell her, when she'd doubtless fought as hard as she possibly could to protect all the ones that she loved, and those who loved her?

"Yes." The lie slid softly off my tongue. "Yes, we won."

She managed a true smile this time. "I saved them. I saved my husband and child."

As her eyes slid shut and all the muscles in her body went slack, all I could think was that _war made a liar out of me.__  
_

I stood once again, my shoulders weighted with the burden of yet another death.

I found another soldier, a man. Once again, I knew that he wouldn't make it. I tried to offer him a drink, but he refused it, telling me to save it for someone who could actually make use of it. I nodded and put the bottle back in my pack. Who was I to deny a man his last request?

Finally, I found another man with injuries that were less severe. I ignored his weak protests that he could walk, and picked him up to take him to a field doctor. I watched as his wounds were cleaned and bandaged. He occasionally cried out in pain, but for the most part he was silent, enduring the agony surprisingly well.

When they were done, he looked up at me in respect and gratitude. "Thank you, Salamander." Those words alone meant the world to me, but he kept talking. "My wife is about to have her child, and if you'd just left me there, he or she would've never seen their father." He paused. "I know that family is one of the things that you cherish most."

Well, who didn't know that about me? Erza and the rest liked to use it as a reassurance to the soldiers, that I would make sure that their families were taken care of. I would, as best as I could. But I wished that they wouldn't use it as an absolute. I, most of all, was aware that I could fail. Unfortunately, everyone else seemed to see me as some sort of invincible hero. Just as this man did, from his expression.

He continued. "So, I guess that what I'm saying is, thanks for keeping mine whole." He grinned at me, and I was eerily reminded of how I used to grin like that.

A ghost of a smile flickered across my face. "You don't need to say that." I told him. "Like you said, I prize family above all else. Thank me by making sure that you finish healing before you go out to battle again. It's stupid to waste four lives because you were impatient."

He blinked in confusion. "Four lives?"

I nodded. "Yours, obviously. You wife's life will be empty without you, if the way that you speak about her is anything to go on. Your child's, because her life won't be complete without a father. And mine." He stared at me, and for the first time in what- a week? I let out a soft laugh. "What's with that look? My job is to protect all of you the best that I possibly can. If you throw that life away, than I'm obviously not doing it right. I've put everything that I have into it. So," I gave him a stern look. "Don't waste it."

He burst out laughing, until tears of mirth were running down his face. "Y-you're an amazing person, you know that?" The injured man choked out. "I've served in many a war before, but you're the first leader that I've had that would actually care about individual people!" He sobered instantly. "But honestly, all of my other officers before wouldn't care in the least whether I lived or died. They certainly wouldn't have been out there combing the field for survivors. And they wouldn't have been caught dead talking to anyone who wasn't either above or directly below them."

A frown creased my face. "Laxus?"

"What? No!" He shook his head violently. "I meant officers in other wars! Laxus is really good, nice guy, pays attention to what we need."

I nodded in acknowledgement. "I'll go now. I have things that I need to do."

He smiled. "Well, duh. I can't go taking all of your time, now can I?"

I ducked out of the healer's tent. Once outside, I turned my face to the night sky and felt the smile drop off my face. For all of my pretty words in there, I had none of that confidence. I wasn't the hero that they thought that I was. I was just a man, trying to live up to what they thought that I was. I closed my eyes, and felt a tear travel down my cheek. For that single man that I had saved, so many more had died on that field. I opened my eyes, and stared up at the moon. _When will this war end?_ I wondered in despair. _When will that man's family be safe? Or will he die, and his family be left inconsolable? _My hands fisted at my sides. "Damn you Acnologia." I whispered. "Damn you."_  
_


	3. Chapter 3: Fallen Hero

**This is in Erza's P.O.V. It's not as OOC as the previous one. Well, Erza isn't very OOC. Our favorite Fire Dragon Slayer is still another story.**

**Veterans, I salute you.**

* * *

I narrowed my eyes at the figure that just stumbled into camp. I'd been waiting for the idiot to come back. I knew that he'd be on foot, after all, he was useless with transportation.

I stalked over to the pinkette, what was covered in dust from the roads. His clothes were ripped and torn, but not badly. To my surprise, he didn't seem to have any wounds except a gas on his right arm that he'd already had when he left.

"What were you thinking!" I raged. "You can't go dashing off to every battle that starts! You need to be working on things here too, you thrice-damned, reckless, hot-headed **idiot! **Ichiya, Jura and Sting rely on you as the head of the largest fort! They have a lot of plans that they need you to look at, and there are even more requests from the soldiers and townspeople that need approval!" I paused for breath, only to notice that he wasn't showing any reaction at all to my words. In fact he didn't seem to be showing any **emotion** at all. Even these days, he was normally very energetic, or at least focused. Focused was usual, calm happened sometimes too when he needed it. But he just looked kind of... empty. His typically bright onyx eyes were dull, vacant.

Something was terribly, horribly wrong here. I lowered my voice. "Alright. What happened."

That seemed to shake him up a little. He looked down at me with a slightly dazed expression. The pinkette clearly hadn't been paying much attention to my rant, which irked me a little. But it was washed into the background by a wave of intense relief that he had reacted. "Huh? Nothing really. I'd better get to the paperwork. Get it over with." He offered a small smile. I didn't accept it.

"You're walking into camp looking like you just died and haven't processed it yet. So don't try to feed me a load of hogwash. Something happened, and it upset you. Spit it out." I folded my arms and gave him my best death glare. It didn't work quite as well now that he was three inches taller than me, though.

He firmed up his expression into the one that I knew he used when he was trying to keep us from worrying. It was set and determined, like he had something that he intended to do. He shook his head, salmon locks swaying slightly. He'd let them grow out shaggily to his shoulders over the years. He said that he liked it, but I highly suspected that he just didn't want to waste time on a haircut. "Nah, you must be imagining things. I'm good."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "You're anything but. What. Happened." My temper was shortening by the second. I hated it when the fire mage lied to me, and I hated even more that he seemed to be doing it more often as the war went on.

He cocked his head slightly to the side, and ran a hand through his hair. "Nothing, Erza. I'm okay." That was pretty much the only thing that I considered worse than him lying. He wasn't just lying, but he was using his best reassuring tone as he did. It worked. I felt my posture relax without my permission. So I did the only thing that I could think of.

"Igneel!" I shouted. "Come knock some sense into your son!"

The dragon ambled over while I glared at him. Igneel was in his human form, so he looked around twenty-five. His hair was a mess of dark red spikes and his eyes were an unnerving green. In build, he was slightly bulky, but I knew from the way he fought that it was muscles, not fat. Considering that he and his son weren't really related, they had shockingly similar features. Igneel, like me, preferred to stay in his armor. It was made form his own shed scales, so it made him more comfortable with being 'small, fragile, and wingless' as he put it.

The fire dragon raised an eyebrow at his Dragon Slayer. "Why do you look like you just walked all the way here from the latest battlefield?" He was even blunter than me._  
_

"Because I did." Not particularly surprising.

"And would you care to tell me why you're first of all, uninjured, and second, stinking of guilt?" I blinked. I **had **to have misheard that.

But judging from the way he stiffened slightly, I hadn't. "No, I wouldn't." There was a coolness to his tone that was a warning to stop interrogating him. But Igneel was as stubborn as the pinkette was obviously going to be.

"What, you weren't able to save someone?" The Dragon Slayer's calm mask broke, turning into an expression of anger and frustration. His hands balled into fists.

"Alright, you nailed it. Happy now?" He snarled. "I collapsed on the way there. By the time I arrived, it was over and we'd lost. Now leave me alone." He stalked away towards his rooms while Igneel and I stared after him in a state of shock.

"Didn't expect that." Igneel murmured. I heard a heavy sigh from behind me, and turned to see Gray and Lucy behind me, looking worried.

"It would've happened eventually." Gray kept his eyes fixed on the door that the furious fire mage had slammed behind himself. "Flamebrain's way overworking himself. He needs to be there for everyone, doing everything. But he can't, he knows that he can't, and he tries to do it anyway." The ice mage shook his head in exasperation. "Idiot."

Lucy gave a sad nod. "If he isn't careful, he could end up just like Father."

Igneel gave her a sideways look. "What happened to your father?"

Lucy looked at the ground like it was the most interesting thing in the world. "He-he worked himself to death."

Igneel bowed his head. "The way he's going, that's entirely possible."He raised his head to look at the infuriatingly clear, blue sky. "When is he going to come back?" The question hung in the air like a lead weight. That was what all of us wanted to know. When we would get back our happy-go-lucky Dragon Slayer. The one that could make everyone smile. I'd always wanted him to grow up a little, but now I just wanted him to have a little of his naïvety back.

But that was what happened in war. People changed, and not always for the better.

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**A virtual cookie to whoever is first to notice the quirk I put in this chapter. All the way through. Hint: pinkette.**


End file.
